Stephen Herondale and an annunciation
by DominiqueMorgenstern
Summary: Stephen/Celine drabble from Stephen's POV. Set during the Circle era, Celine announces to Stephen that she is pregnant with Jace.


Céline said it quickly, a confession she'd audibly rehearsed over to herself many times: "I'm pregnant."

She did not look up. He watched her eyes skit around the kitchen, tacitly avoiding his gaze.

He found himself apprehensively spitting out, "Wh-_what?_"

He heard with clarity his thoughtlessly devastated tone, and a small pang of regret clawed at his panic when he saw her tense expression recoil, wincing. Still, she did not have the courage to look at him, and he did not give her another chance to speak.

"Are y—are you sure?" Stephen heard his clunky stuttering with another kind of shock — he was normally so eloquent and masterful with words — he always had been — that to hear himself stumble over them was unnatural, as if an entirely alien voice was emanating from his throat.

Céline's eyes darted to the ceiling, and she pressed her lips together. "Yes," she said upwards, her voice tight and small, "I'm sure." Her tone brooked no uncertainty.

"But," Stephen fought on blindly, defiantly— as an inevitable sequence of thoughts seduced the words away from his mouth. But from Céline's pained expression, she had undoubtedly guessed where his objection lay: they had only been married a few months; the consummation of which had not been performed, on his side, with much frequency or passion. Amatis was too much in his thoughts. She always would be. And therein was the terrible, pulsing root of his horror. Amatis. How she would feel about this? To watch years of marriage glide away happily, but fruitlessly — then their marriage severed, and next to see her ex-husband so quickly conceive a child with the woman who had supplanted her? It was indecent; a double insult, grating at a wound as one exchanged, as Valentine thought, for a purer, less tainted association.

_By the angel, _Stephen despaired, _how has my life become this?_

Céline took a deep breath, steeling herself, and stepped valiantly towards him. She took Stephen's right hand, her black voyance rune standing out against her lightly tanned skin. She guided his hand to her stomach, and, flattening it, drew it downwards, until his palm encountered a defined, but sturdy curve. Very slight, but it was there. Instantly, Stephen ripped his hand away as something like guilt and self-disgust rampaged inside him.

Were it not for the rune on his arm, he thought, this would be a scandal. Wrong. He would be contemptible for what he had done to her – to a girl so young, so, so young. Pregnant with his child. And yet she _was _his wife. But the thought did not mitigate his feelings. Whenever he had imagined himself as a father, with a family, his mind invariably conjured up images of Amatis. Not this. Not this. Stephen could not look at Céline and feel as if he had any rightful claim over her. How could he? He barely knew her; could barely look at her face and resist the power of the knowledge that he was nearly ten years her junior. There was a gulf between them and she was nothing like Amatis. Nothing like her. It both infuriated and relieved him that he could not find pale suggestions of her in his new wife. Stephen doubted whether he would ever get used to hearing his name, slightly mispronounced and heavily accented, called in a soft, low timbre instead of the loud, clear ripple of Amatis's voice, perpetually hiding a smile. Even the way they walked was different; Céline stayed near his side, her strides shorter, smoother and more deferential. Amatis's gait, however, had always been buoyantly determined, playfully distant. Sometimes Stephen would observe Céline and smother the urge to shout at her to look less as if she was awaiting an order, or his approval.

Valentine had once told him how strange it was to see a girl with such a beautiful head on her shoulders walk alongside the man she loved so diffidently. Stephen had stared at Valentine, outraged, a sharp retort on the edge of his tongue – he despised being told his wife's love for him was unreciprocated, because it was so true – and he'd thought of whom Valentine was comparing her to. Jocelyn. The great and singular exception to his charismatic authority. Indeed he seemed to love her precisely _because _her natural regalness conferred little regard for his. Stephen had remained silent, and thought cruelly that he'd only said it because he knew that his own affection for Jocelyn was unbalanced. Everyone in the Circle could see that his wife was wandering from him. Afterwards, Stephen had grudgingly conceded how right Valentine was. He would have been an idiot if he'd not thought so before. If he had been a younger man, he'd thought, in a world where Amatis had never existed, he would have every right to consider himself ridiculously lucky: Céline _was _beautiful. In many ways, much more classically beautiful than Amatis had been. In truth, her name was apt – there was a celestial, lofty look about her fine features that made her appear faintly gilded. And of course, she was intelligent, kind, loving, a good Shadowhunter. It upset him that there was nothing reasonable to be unhappy about. There were many Shadowhunters, probably, who could have loved and cherished her as she deserved – who could have given her everything he could not.

"I went to see the Silent Brothers," Céline said. "They told me," her voice dropped to a whisper, "it will be a boy."

He did not say anything. He kept staring at that place in her stomach, having no idea what his face was revealing, as he envisaged himself as a father. A _father. _And Céline the _mother. _He heard her breath tremble, and he glanced up—meeting her hazel* eyes. Like two burnished gold coins, she looked at him through brimming tears, swirling with artless hurt and undisguised love as she said brokenly, "I'm sorry." The tears fell. Unthinkingly, he grabbed her shoulders and put his arms around her. At least he wouldn't have to look at her face. Céline hesitantly placed her hands on his waist in return.

"Oh God, Céline, no—don't _apologise—_I didn't mean you make you cry—" he was about to say, _I'm sorry. I am the one who put you in this position, _before it occurred to him that she was crying _because _he was unhappy. He marvelled over how she could possibly be happy at the idea of having a child at the age of 19 – with a husband who couldn't love her back. Or perhaps it was Valentine's gladness she'd been looking forward to? Valentine had never said so, but the implication was always there, in making him his lieutenant. Even in his private life, he must set an example — avoid the mistakes his once brother-in-law made: _avoid breeding with anyone tangentially related to Werewolves. Downworlders. _And now, with Céline's pregnancy, Valentine could snuggle down and mull over how successful a project he'd made of him.

Stephen felt the coldness of Céline's tears at the same time he felt the coldness inside him. He wondered if, after all this time, his parents weren't right after all – about Valentine. Was everything he'd done in the Circle a catastrophic mistake?

But no, his parents were exactly the reason he'd joined – so he could make a better, reformed future for Shadowhunters. Like the Shadowhunter his child would grow up to be. If anything, he thought, he should do this for it—for _him._

Perhaps he wouldn't make such a bad father, after all.

* I asked Cassandra a very long time ago about how it was genetically possible that Jace has golden eyes. She replied that she had hazel eyes.


End file.
